Growing up on a small pig farm in rural Western Kentucky has given Neil Powell a singular perspective on the fragility of life, the inevitability of death, the shadow of loneliness, and the underappreciated ability to castrate a hog. Much of his childhood was spent in isolation, surrounded by the breathtaking beauty of the countryside and the inescapable ugliness of poverty and addiction. Neils work searches for meaning and understanding of these experiences and how they have led him down his life path. By obsessively documenting the personalities of small town life, their often-conflicting attitudes and his emotional struggle to leave for something better, the resulting images take the form of maps, diagrams and schematics that have been described as modern day hieroglyphics.

Powell’s Down by the Side of the Road opens tonight at 222 Gallery, located at 451 N. Fairfax, LA, California. The show runs until August 1.